Argument premises used to validate organizational change: Mormon representations of plural marriage

Abstract

Organizations are highly resistant to ideological change, yet must frequently adapt with their environments. The arguments used to justify change are, therefore, among an institutions most important means of survival. This essay examines organizational justification for change by analyzing sources of argument used by the Mormon Church to justify first the practice, then the abandonment, of plural marriage. In both cases, premises of argument that combined both transcendent and situational claims allowed the institution to respond to potentially dislocating environmental demands without changing its ideological posture or sacrificing its members’ sense of organizational identification.